Part 3
Wil watched as Paul stood there with his phone pressed to his ear, doing more listening than talking, occasionally interrupting the other person with “yes” or “okay” or “sounds good”. Eventually he spoke an actual sentence.
“Okay I’ll think about it and call you back alright?”
He waited for a reply and then hung up the phone. Wil immediately asked the question that had been weighing on his mind for the last few minutes.
“Who was it?”
“Corinne.”
Wil paused briefly before speaking again.
“What did she want?”
Paul walked over and sat on the edge of the couch, looking back at Wil.
“She wants me to come down to Melbourne for a couple of weeks. They’re doing a few big live shows for Rove and they want me to come down and appear and help out.”
“Are you going to go?”
“Well I wanted to head down to Melbourne anyway, I always go down for a bit of a break. Can you come with me?”
“No.”
”Why not?”
“I’m working remember? I’ve got those shows and stuff on, and I’ve got to get ready to go back to the breakfast show soon as well. So unlike you I can’t just take off to Melbourne.”
“What exactly do you mean ‘unlike you’?”
“I mean unlike you who doesn’t have any jobs or commitments. Well I do have work to do and commitments I’ve made, so I can’t just piss off to another state whenever I feel like it.”
Wil didn’t know why he was being such an arsehole to Paul, but he knew there had to be a reason for it. Maybe he was just hurt about the fact that so soon into their relationship Paul was already willing to go to Melbourne for two weeks and be away from him.
Wil looked back at Paul, and saw that he was just staring at him with a look of hurt and disbelief on his face.
“I don’t need to be reminded I don’t have a job at the moment, and you know why? Because I don’t care. I’ve spent the last five years working my arse off every week to entertain people and I think I’ve deserved a bit of a break. I’m sorry if you suddenly have some problem with that.”
Wil sighed.
“I don’t have a problem with anything Paul.”
“You sure about that?”
Wil stared at the floor, not willing to look at Paul’s face again because he knew that Paul would see right through him and know perfectly well that there was something bothering him.
“I don’t have a problem. Go to Melbourne, have fun with Corinne.”
”Where the fuck did that one come from?” Wil silently asked himself. He forced himself to look over at Paul and immediately didn’t like the look on his face. Paul stood up from the couch and walked closer to Wil.
“So that’s what you’re worried about? You think I’m going to sleep with Corinne? Well it’s nice to know that as much as you might love me, you still can’t fucking trust me.”
”I trust you Paul.”
“Bullshit. If you trusted me you’d have no problem about me going to Melbourne.”
Wil stood up as well.
“I don’t have a fucking problem alright! You want to go to Melbourne? Fine then just go! I don’t care!”
“Fine I will!”
“Fine!”
And with that last shouted word, Wil headed out the front door, slamming it behind him. Paul shouted a few more obscenities before picking up his phone again and wandering into the bedroom.
He lay down on the bed and dialed the number he still knew off by heart and waited for the person on the other end to answer. He heard the familiar female voice in his ear and then he spoke.
“Corinne? It’s Paul. Yeah I’d love to come down.”
part 4